Sweet the Taste
by Clannadlvr
Summary: As he waits for the CIA to arrive on their wild goose chase to South Africa, Sark remembers the first time he drank champagne. Spoilers through Echoes.


Title: "Sweet the Taste"

Author: Clannadlvr

Fandom/Character: Alias, Sark

Rating: PG-13 for language

Spoilers: Whole series, most especially "Echoes"

A/N: Written for slodwick's 1000 words challenge on live journal. (lj community picfor1000) A huge thanks to my beta, strangefancy, for the suggestions, edits, and great title!

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As he waits in the empty warehouse for them to arrive, he remembers the day he first tasted freedom.

He's not one given to poetic metaphors, beyond their use in perturbing his opponents, but this one is so apt that he allows it. He almost welcomes the flood of memories locked away for so long that accompanies the notion, in anticipation of bubbles breaking along his tongue.

His attention to detail, a photographic memory that encompasses all five senses, has served him well in his profession, easily making him the protégé of his employer. It amuses him that his captors wonder at his loyalties when they've always been the same. What more could he give the woman who gave him the opportunities his childhood had not? While his birthright had been palatial, it had been to a man who had cast him aside, and whose subsequent attempts at monetary compensation were not enough to save him from the flames of an expertly applied blowtorch. Memories of his surrogate family were still too sharp in his mind to allow for mercy.

For a moment, he lets the utilitarian workbench and the sterile interior of the room fade away to the smells of London's underbelly. The air is filled with the stench of exhaust and garbage, a cocktail of waste that streams over broken concrete sidewalks and pockmarked pavement. He's thirteen years old today, not that a celebration is imminent. His foster father and mother have sent him outside to work the crowd, to pick the pockets of passersby who have barely more than they do. Even in his "work," "Jules" isn't granted freedom to go where he wishes. His every movement is watched by the facsimile of a father he's been granted these past twelve years. This paternal substitute says Jules is in training and should be grateful for the responsibility he's been given, but finishing that statement with "you ungrateful little fuck," doesn't exactly inspire confidence.

So here he is, tethered to the shadows as he weaves through the mass of people, doing as he's been bid. Passing a ramshackle bakery, his eyes are drawn to the hideous birthday cake lying beyond the scarred plexiglass and he realizes that he's on the knife edge between boyhood and his teen years, a hairsbreadth away from being a man.

And in the moment, he feels the oppressive hold of his "father's" influence more keenly than in all the years of beatings and betrayals.

He sees a break in the crowd and before he knows what he's doing, he takes it. Slipping through the throng the way he's been taught, he finds himself moving with more grace and speed than he ever remembers possessing. It occurs to him somewhere, in the murky depths of an emerging consciousness, that for the first time in his existence he truly wants something so badly that mind, body, and soul work together toward that goal. Escape has become his one obsession.

He easily outruns his "father," but that small victory is not enough. Jules runs faster and faster, as if the hounds of hell nip at his heels. The faces of the people who crowd the streets, who once seemed to be the adjudicators of his fate, melt into the strokes of a brush dipped in many colors. From bright to muddy until only thing definite in the world is Jules. No, Julian.

And then he sees it. The warehouse is relatively nondescript, the metal sheeting on the outside marred by faded advertisements. But for some reason it calls to him, a flare of the instincts he'll rely on in his future life. Finding a rent in the metal walls, he easily slips through it and into the darkness. As his eyes adjust to the light, he encounters the smell of packing crates and something savory, like the market on delivery day. The reminder of his home should send him running, but he realizes the difference. Here the air is dry, lacking the humid stench of unwashed masses and dole-fed children. Through sawdust and plastic peanuts, the contents of his haven reveal themselves. Every food he's ever imagined, a veritable trove of Turkish Delights, is at his fingertips.

Moving through the large building, he comes across one particular room, just beyond the shipping bay. He assesses the contents of the room and realizes that every package, every box, has been prepared for outgoing shipments from the U.K. The labels read like an atlas and Julian revels in day dreams of what places like Tokyo, Melbourne, and Chicago are like. Then his eye catches a stack of boxes bound for Johannesburg encased in foam with "fragile" stamped on the outside. He's been on the streets long enough to understand that what's privileged is protected and, therefore, more desirable. The pocket knife he always carries slips easily into his hand and through the corrugated cardboard. In a few quick motions, he's revealed the treasure within.

As he reaches inside and grabs a bottle of something that he's only seen in adverts, his heart races. Trembling hands work the cork, full of the knowledge that he's holding a glimpse of how the other half lives. He jumps as the cork flies across the room and a cascade of liquid gold runs over his hand to the floor. Lifting the Dom Perignon to his lips, he arches back his head, and tastes…

It's sweet and a bit sour, but more than anything, full of sensation. Bubbles race across his tongue and his eyes light up in wonder, his body responding to its first taste of alcohol and the lingering high from running.

A whole lifetime later, he's back in a warehouse again, the adrenaline of his flight not unlike that of years ago. And once again, there's a bottle of champagne. As he pops the cork, this time not wasting a drop, he makes a quiet toast to the day he left the slums behind and opened himself up to destiny.

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End file.
